Part of the fun and challenge of Amateur
Radio High Altitude Ballooning (ARHAB) is to push the envelope towards
new achievements. Ralph Wallio, WØRPK, maintains an ARHAB Flight Records
page on his website (www.arhab.org) that documents some of these
achievements. Each year a contest is held with categories such as
Highest Altitude, Longest Flight Time, Greatest Flight Distance,
Greatest Telemetry Reception Range (VHF/ UHF), Greatest Telemetry
Reception Range (HF), and Greatest Two-Way QSO via balloon transponder
or repeater.

Several balloon groups have been pushing
towards the ultimate goal of having a balloon repeater/transponder that
flies for several days at high altitude. Imagine having the equivalent
of an AMSAT satellite that floats slowly across the U.S. (or around the
world) for hours or days. The great advantage of a BalloonSat is that
due to its slow speed relative to an AMSAT bird and its closer proximity
to Earth, anyone with a modest amateur radio station can easily work
through the balloon relay without worrying about slinging antennas
rapidly across the sky, and much lower power is necessary to make a
contact. Some of the two-way QSOs that were made via a VHF/UHF balloon
repeater have been over 700 miles (a 777-mile DX QSO is the record so
far, set by N8DEZ/6 and N5QO via the ANSR balloon relay from Phoenix,
Arizona).

The Contenders

One of the ultimate goals, and also the
toughest to achieve, has been to lob a balloon payload clear across the
Atlantic Ocean. The unmanned balloon equivalent of Charles Lindbergh’s
transatlantic solo flight, a handful of balloon groups have taken up the
challenge and the race is on!

It turns out that the best time of year to
achieve a transatlantic flight is during the winter months. The jet
stream can exceed 170 knots at this time of year, and the trend is for a
flight that goes east at a high speed. Some days the winds are so strong
that a balloon could make the transit in less than 48 hours.

So far four groups have thrown their hats in
the ring, and there could be a few more as the competition heats up. In
alphabetical order, here are the current contenders:

ANSR

The Arizona Near Space Research (ANSR) group
(www.ansr.org) plans to fly a custom-built payload that includes APRS as
well as PSK-31 telemetry (see photo 1). Using a circuit designed and
built by Michael Gray, KD7LMO, this multi-band HF PSK-31 telemetry
transmitter can be heard for thousands of miles, allowing anyone with a
modest HF PSK-31 station to follow the flight’s progress. (Michael’s
innovative circuit designs can be viewed at: <www.kd7lmo.net>.)

In addition to its extensive student
experiment program using conventional latex balloons, ANSR has achieved
some remarkable long-duration flights using a special plastic balloon
designed and supplied by Mark Caviezel of Global Western. The group has
made several multi-day flights so far, and the longest mission has been
775 miles downrange. If ANSR makes it across the Atlantic, it will
indeed be quite an achievement, since the group has the disadvantage of
having to trek across most of the continental U.S. before reaching the
Atlantic seaboard.